Understanding Connected Worlds through Water

Connected Worlds, a groundbreaking exhibition at the New York Hall of Science, immerses visitors in a fantastical universe where they can affect the health of six distinct biomes through gestures, movements, and decisions they make about the balance of the overall environment. All of the biomes share a common resource: water, which flows across the interactive floor from a waterfall, the exhibition’s centerpiece.

Through gestures and manipulation of physical objects, visitors guide water among the worlds, cultivate them and explore how the complex system underlying Connected Worlds works. As visitors interact with plants and creatures, they discover the interconnectedness of the different environments and experience how individual and collective actions can have widespread impact.

They learn systems concepts important to understanding sustainability such as feedback loops, stocks and flows, delays and equilibrium in a dynamic environment. The experience affords the opportunity for teachers to help their students understand how systems thinking relates to understanding sustainability and make analogies to better grasp how the complexity of our own world functions. Visit the Connected Worlds exhibition.